A longstanding system of exploitation originated with the political manipulations of agribusiness in the former Banana Republics. From the massacre of thousands of protesting banana workers by the Colombian Military at the behest of the United Fruit Company, to the coup that overthrew Guatemalan president, Jacobo Arbenz, and to recent payments to paramilitary death squads by Chiquita; political meddling by the fruit companies has always had fatal consequences.